West Cliffs a fan­tas­tiC Chal­lenge

This is a sym­bol of the con­fi­dence of tourism en­trepreneurs, and also a good sign of the evo­lu­tion tak­ing place in Por­tu­gal, said the Eco­nom­ics Min­is­ter, Manuel Caldeira Cabral, at the of­fi­cial open­ing of West Cliffs, the first golf course to be opened in Por­tu­gal since 2012. And next year there will be the open­ing of an­other golf course. It will be a Fin­nish in­vest­ment at the Quinta da Om­bria (Loulé), de­signed by Por­tuguese Jorge San­tana da Silva, with a planned open­ing in March or April 2018. West Cliffs is the re­sult of an am­bi­tious project at the Praia d’El Rey, which is al­ready a huge suc­cess. In the fif­teen days pre­ced­ing the of­fi­cial open­ing it reg­is­tered some thou­sand rounds, and in the same pe­riod some seven thou­sand reser­va­tions have come in for the com­ing months, un­til the end of the year. This new course, the fourth to be opened in the West Re­gion, next to the ex­cel­lent beaches be­tween Peniche and the Obidos La­goon, oc­cu­pies 80 of the 230 hectares of the re­sort sited within a few min­utes of the Praia d’El Rey, in an area of­fer­ing fab­u­lous views over the ocean and the Ber­len­gas Is­lands.West Cliffs rep­re­sents an in­vest­ment of 21,5 mil­lion euro, of which seven were for the golf course. The project in­cludes ex­clu­sive real es­tate and two ho­tels, the first one (5 stars) to be opened within two to three years, be­tween the club­house and the beach, and boast­ing 130 rooms. The course was de­signed by Amer­i­can Cyn­this Dye (Dye De­sign Group), and is based on sandy soil, fair­ways lined by lo­cal veg­e­ta­tion and pine for­est, which also some­times comes into play. The pro­tec­tion of na­ture and of the en­vi­ron­ment have been – and con­tinue to be – an im­por­tant el­e­ment in the con­struc­tion of this lux­ury re­sort. The of­fi­cial open­ing was presided over by Eco­nom­ics Min­is­ter Manuel Caldeira Cabarl (who also had his first golf ex­pe­ri­ence), with the pres­ence of the Sec­re­tary of State for Tourism, Ana Men­des God­inho, the Pres­i­dent of the FPG, en­ti­ties linked to Tourism Por­tu­gal and Tourism of Cen­tral Por­tu­gal and other of­fi­cials